GENEEAL HINTS. 67 



strengthen tlie other portion of the tree. Continue to be watchful as 

 to other buds that will be continually pushing from the main stem, and 

 let not one grow but those you have selected for the head. 



At the end of the year, these will have made considerable growth, 

 and, instead of being cut back the next spring to two eyes, as is the 

 case with many, cut them back only so far as to insure the strength 

 of the remainder, say, so as to leave five or six eyes. The next season 

 of growth, there will, out of three or four branches, come four or five 

 branches each. Those which come in their places, to help form a 

 handsome head, may be allowed to grpw; but if any come so as to 

 cross others, or where there is plenty of growth already, let them be 

 rubbed off; but it is quite possible for an eye to shoot where it is not 

 wanted, and yet the first or second eye of that shoo.t may be in a 

 direction to fill up a vacancy where it is necessary ; this must, of 

 course, be looked to before buds are rubbed off. These branches, when 

 grown another season, will stretch out the head on all sides to a re- 

 spectable size, and enable you to thin out the weak wood, and cutback 

 the strong; so that instead of having the head pimping and small, it 

 may bear a proportion to the stem ; for, as we have said before, the 

 head ought to be as wide across as the stem is long from the ground, 

 to the under part of the head. There is one thing to be observed with 

 regard to standards on their own bottom : they never break off, nor 

 decay, nor canker, half so much as budded and grafted ones. 



GENERAL HINTS. 



"We may mention, as a general characteristic, that there is no plant 

 which yields more willingly to culture than the Eose, nor in the 

 growth of which there is so much certainty. If you desire a large 

 quantity of bloom, and are not anxious about the size of the flowers, 

 there is nothing required but to spare the knife ; take out weak shoots, 

 but leave plenty of wood on the tree ; for every eye wiU bloom, and 



